


Valencia

by glitteratiglue



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: M/M, Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Reunions, Spain, Steve pines for Bucky even when they're together, not sponsored by the Valencian tourist board
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-20
Updated: 2016-03-20
Packaged: 2018-05-27 21:30:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,881
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6301135
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/glitteratiglue/pseuds/glitteratiglue
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After Bucky left, Steve expected a lot of things. He certainly didn't expect to find Bucky in a European coastal city, by all accounts doing pretty well for himself.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Valencia

**Author's Note:**

> Post-TWS. Bucky and Steve are very bad at feelings. Don't ask me why it had to be in Spain *hands*.
> 
> Also fulfils the square 'Unrequited Love/Pining' on my trope bingo [card](http://glitteratiglue.dreamwidth.org/1844.html).

Steve hasn’t seen Bucky in thirteen months. The cactus on his windowsill has grown a few inches, but everything else is the same.

He sleeps, eats, goes on missions for SHIELD. He doesn’t hear from Bucky.

Natasha comes over a couple of times a week to hijack Steve’s Netflix queue. Sam worries, and Steve often catches him watching him with that expression he gets when he’s got something to say, but isn’t sure Steve is ready to hear it.

Time ticks on, and Steve measures it in the slow, inexorable pulse of his heart beating beneath his ribs.

(His heart’s not beating for himself. Never did.)

* * *

One minute Bucky was here. He was good;  _they_  were good. Steve was better with Bucky here, he thinks. Happier, easier with himself.

And then, on a cool April morning, Bucky had shouldered a sports bag with a few possessions inside, and he’d left.

Steve remembers the look on Bucky’s face—tired, defeated—the sound of his metal fingers clacking against the polished wood of the door as he pulled it open.

“I’ll see you, Steve,” he’d said right before he went, trying for even though the words were cracking as they came out of his throat.

(Afterwards, Steve had thought about lying down on Bucky’s bed, breathing in the scent of him left on the sheets. Crying into the pillow, maybe. As if it would help. It was freeing to imagine, however fleetingly, being that selfish. That weak.)

* * *

The worst thing: Steve was better with Bucky, but Bucky wasn’t better with  _him_.

He remembers the good times just fine: Bucky’s warm thigh pressed into his while they sat together on the couch. His metal fingers curled around the back of Steve’s elbow, seeking the grounding sensation of touch. Putting on the record player and singing along to old songs while they made dinner.

And one day: more. There hadn’t been much of a build-up. Bucky had kissed Steve, tentative and soft, and Steve had returned all his affection tenfold while worrying about whether Bucky was ready for this. What kind of person it made him, to fuck his best friend while he was still recovering from seventy years of brainwashing. In the end, Steve was too selfish to resist. He’d been too desperate to reclaim a past they’d both lost to consider whether or not this was supposed to be Bucky’s future.

(Not that it had ever been like  _this_  before. Certainly not in the war, and not in Brooklyn, either. But that didn't mean they hadn't both wanted it all the same. Or maybe that was just what Steve told himself to justify it.)

“I’m sure about this,” Bucky had insisted, his blue eyes very serious when they looked at Steve. Steve had nodded, but the hard knot in the pit of his stomach had tightened.

They went on like that for a while: Steve with questioning eyes, and Bucky with hunched shoulders and guilt stamped all over his face. Both of them getting little sleep from the nightmares that made Bucky wake in a haze of cold sweat, sheets and mattress filling shredded by his metal fingers.

Steve had thought finding each other would have only been the start, that the sheer improbability of their survival would have been enough to fix it all.

It wasn’t.

* * *

Thirteen months, twelve days.

Steve gets back from a run to find a letter in his mailbox. It’s sunny for May, and he blinks owlishly against the sun’s glare before he really looks at the envelope. The address is printed in a familiar script. It’s Bucky’s handwriting; he’d know it anywhere.

He takes the stairs three at a time and lets himself into the apartment.

Steve thinks he might need to sit down for this. Still sweaty from his run, he rubs a hand over his face and settles into a chair to read. Turning the envelope over, he carefully thumbs open the flap.

He’s steeling himself, but to his surprise, there’s no note inside, just a one-way plane ticket.

* * *

“Valencia?” Natasha stares at the ticket in her hands. Her face brightens. “I hear the paella’s great there. They make a special kind, Coulson says. It’s got rabbit.”

Steve’s never eaten rabbit; he raises an eyebrow. “Helpful, thanks,” he says. “Not like I wanted advice or anything.” He stretches and puts his feet up on the couch, trying not to crowd Natasha.

Her eyes are fixed on the screen; she’s opened up Steve’s Netflix and is idly flicking through endless _House of Cards_ episodes.

“Isn’t that why I’m here?” Her voice has an innocent lilt, but Steve knows better than anyone that Natasha never speaks without a reason. “To convince you into taking all that SHIELD vacation time you’ve never used.”

“Do we even still have vacation time,” Steve says, puzzled. “I thought Coulson and Fury’s operations were pretty small-potatoes these days.”

“Steve,” Natasha says patiently, “I think Captain America can take vacation time whenever he wants.”

Steve prods her with a socked foot. “Right.”

* * *

Sam is equally unhelpful when Steve calls him.

“Long-distance booty call,” he says, sounding like he’s trying hard not to laugh. "Like, hella long-distance. He’s really got it bad for you.”

“Shut up,” Steve mutters, ducking his head even though it’s not like Sam can see him blushing furiously.

“Look,” Sam says calmly, “I think you should see what he’s got to say.”

And damn it, Steve hates it when Sam’s right. But he is.

* * *

After a short layover in Heathrow, Steve lands in Spain, tired and fretful.

His stomach twists as he makes his way to arrivals. He tells himself it’s hunger, but he ate a whole bunch of snacks on the plane.

Bucky’s there, right on time. His hair’s longer, scraped off his face in a loose ponytail (that’s new for him, Steve thinks, idly). He looks good: healthy and steady in a way Steve doesn’t remember.

Steve hovers awkwardly, wondering whether to go for a hug or handshake.

Bucky ends up making the decision for both of them. He steps into Steve’s space and pulls him into a bone-crushing hug, no hesitation.

“Hey, Steve,” Bucky breathes, sounding relieved. Like he really is happy to see him.

“Bucky,” Steve says, his voice small.

Bucky’s hand rests on Steve’s shoulder for a second before he pulls away, a touch Steve feels like a brand. He reaches down and lifts Steve’s bag. “Let’s go.”

* * *

They go to Bucky’s place—a small, simply furnished but pleasant apartment up three flights of stairs—and then straight out to a hole-in-the-wall jazz bar, the kind with about ten tables.

Everybody seems to know him there: the owner kisses them on both cheeks (Steve’s still getting used to this part) and calls Bucky  _Diego._

At that, Steve quirks an eyebrow. Bucky grins and shrugs, leaning in to explain quietly how people here know him as James.

(Steve hopes against hope it means something, that Bucky hasn’t shared the particulars of his nickname with any of these people. For whatever reason, this is a piece of Bucky only  _he_ gets to have. He isn’t sure whether he should be flattered or not.)

The band’s great—a five-piece, more contemporary than the stuff on Steve’s record player—and he remembers Bucky tapping his foot to music just like this. The memory is decades old, faded and soft at the edges, but it makes something ache in his bones.

Bucky meets Steve’s eye and slides a finger of bourbon to him across the bar. For a moment, it seems like no time has passed.

* * *

Steve learns Bucky acquired his apartment courtesy of Hydra, which isn't all that surprising. It used to be a safe house, but had long been abandoned by the previous occupants. Bucky shows Steve his stash of unmarked bills, far more than the modest government salary Steve receives in his bank account each month. It doesn't look like he spends much of it.

“So, what do you do here?” Steve blurts out while Bucky's cooking, and immediately regrets saying it.

Bucky raises an eyebrow. “Pursue my varied interests. You know. Cold-blooded murder. Cleaning my knife collection. That kind of thing.”

Steve frowns.

“That was a joke, Steve.” Bucky sighs, fiddling with the wooden spoon in his hand. He adds, “I didn’t do much of anything, at first. I mean, you remember what I was like.”

There’s a pause, and Steve’s afraid he’s going to have to talk about the reasons why he's here. He isn't sure if he can do that yet. Thankfully, Bucky turns back to the stove and the moment passes.

For dinner, Bucky serves up some sort of concoction of shrimp and rice, which actually tastes pretty good.

Steve remembers Bucky's cooking being awful. That’s another thing that’s changed. He doesn't know what to think.

* * *

They make it three days before falling into bed together.

Steve isn’t exactly shocked when it happens—God knows, they’re only human—but the how and the why of it do surprise him. Before, it was always Bucky making the first move. Rough, desperate kisses; his thumbs pressing white grooves into Steve’s hipbones while they moved together. It was always quick, furtive — they weren’t ashamed, but taking their time over sex was an indulgence neither of them were ready for.

The point is, it’s not planned. After dinner, they go up to the terrace and Bucky points out the sights of the city: the soccer stadium, the pairs of towers that once marked the gates of the old town. The air’s slow and muggy, and Bucky is smiling, relaxed, a hand on Steve’s arm to turn him towards whatever he wants to show him next.

He’s  _happy._ Happier than he ever looked living in Steve’s apartment in Brooklyn.

A fist is clenching around Steve’s heart, squeezing tight. All of a sudden, he can’t breathe. So of course, he decides that the only thing to do is to get in Bucky’s space and kiss him senseless, all sliding tongue and heated breaths and a thigh judiciously shoved between Bucky’s legs to draw soft moans from his throat.

Bucky doesn’t seem to have any complaints, anyway: he’s eager, and playful in a way Steve doesn’t remember, biting at his ear and smacking him gently on the ass as they stumble down the stairs to the bedroom.

The room is almost unbearably hot, and the sex is sweaty and languid; hands slipping on damp skin and hungry, wet kisses that feel like they’re trying to swallow each other whole.

“God,” Bucky gasps out afterwards. They’re tangled in a sprawl of sweaty limbs on his cream sheets, the white walls plain around them. “You’re gonna kill me, Rogers.”

“I’ll try not to,” Steve replies muzzily. He yawns, rolling onto his back.

A painting of a sun hangs above the bed, a mess of impressionistic orange-and-red brushstrokes. Steve stares at it, an incongruous splash of colour in the neutral surroundings.

He had no idea Bucky even liked modern art.

His gaze shifts to Bucky to see he’s watching him, a soft smile on his face. It’s brighter than the sun in the painting: Bucky’s cheeks are dimpled, his teeth gleaming white where they’re on show.

“Like it?” Bucky asks quietly. “It’s not famous or anything. Some art student over at the university did it. Sold it to me for peanuts.”

“It’s okay,” Steve says, light. “A little modern for my taste,” he adds, and that earns him a sharp laugh from Bucky.

He stares back at the picture, thinking how it actually seems at home here, with this new, relaxed Bucky. It should make Steve happier than he’s ever been, the knowledge that Bucky’s okay. That he’s healing.

He realizes, achingly, that’s part of the problem. Without Bucky, he was grey, his life as featureless as his bare apartment walls. He wasn’t whole. Conversely, without Steve, Bucky has unfurled, grown into himself. He wears this unfamiliar life like a second skin—effortlessly, calmly—and it leaves Steve terrified. Maybe he doesn’t fit anywhere in this new world Bucky’s made for himself.

Bucky seems to sense his anxiety, because he shuffles forward on his elbows to press a kiss to Steve’s chest. It’s sweet, without a grain of expectation, and that makes Steve’s throat close up.

“We should shower,” Steve says abruptly. He swings his legs off the bed. The cool of the tiled floor is welcome on his bare feet, a counterpoint to the rank heat in the air.

Behind him, Bucky sighs, but he gets up and follows him anyway.

* * *

A long, thin park rings the city in an arc of green. Bucky takes Steve running there in the early morning, before the sun comes up.

He still wears gloves—the arm isn’t an easy thing to explain—and jogs at an acceptably human pace, a practice Steve follows.

They stand and rest on a bridge lined with flowers as the sun nudges its way from beneath the horizon. It’s beautiful here, but Steve can’t help but think of the metal and concrete of another bridge they once stood on. The screech of car tires, the silver flash of Bucky’s fingers curled into the asphalt.

Steve watches Bucky stretch, take a drink from his water bottle. In his haste, some of it spills. Drops of water roll down Bucky's chin, his neck, to where he’s sweated through his long-sleeved t-shirt. The sun's rising at his back and his left sleeve has ridden up, the light catching on the plates of his metal arm.

 _I’m sorry_ , Steve thinks. _I shouldn’t have given you up for dead._

“Buck, I —” Steve tries, but the half-formed words freeze on his tongue.

“I’m glad you’re here,” Bucky says, cutting him off smoothly. He tugs his sleeve back down, and his gaze is wary.

He offers the water to Steve, and Steve drinks deeply, glad to have something to do with his hands.

* * *

At night, while Bucky sleeps beside him, Steve lies awake, the weight of guilt pressing down on his chest like a stone.

He hadn’t looked for Bucky in the ravine, hadn’t once entertained the idea that Zola’s experiments could have left Bucky alive.

All those months ago, he’d wondered if that’s why Bucky had left—because he couldn’t bear to look him in the eye when Steve had failed him so badly—but now he’s not so sure. He’s not sure about anything.

* * *

Bucky doesn’t have a TV, so they have to watch on-demand on a laptop balanced awkwardly on a stack of books atop the coffee table.

The list is full of BBC Worldwide nature shows, but Steve doesn’t really mind. Animals and plants are a relatively safe subject, unlikely to lead to any serious discussions.

Halfway through a David Attenborough documentary about birds, Bucky remarks, “You’re smiling, Steve.”

“So?” Steve finds himself saying, a little defensive. He sets his jaw. “I do smile, you know.”

Bucky laughs and says, “Let’s see if I can make you do it again.”

He clambers on top of Steve and kisses him until Steve’s laughing too, and they’re both breathless and hard.

On the screen, a group of Emperor penguins dive off the rocks into open sea.

Steve’s fingers are at the fastenings of Bucky’s pants. He opens his mouth to the yielding press of Bucky’s tongue and lets himself fall.

* * *

They visit a lot of places: the market, the futuristic aquarium, the antiques store where Bucky likes to buy knick-knacks for his place, but the schedule is flexible.

The hottest part of the day is usually spent inside, the stores all closed for the _siesta_ period, and Steve quickly gets used to it. If only he found this new Bucky as easy to get used to. A lot of the time, Bucky seems happy just to _be_ : he reads, listens to music, or just lies back on the couch, eyes closed and his head resting on Steve’s chest _._

Sometimes Bucky does sudoku or crosswords, hunkered down into the cushions of his squashy couch with a pen between his teeth and a furrowed brow. Steve sits beside him, sketching, his teeth worrying away at his bottom lip all the while. The quiet makes him anxious.

Today, Bucky’s got a Rubik's cube, the pieces clicking as he turns them. Steve watches him fondly, Bucky’s tongue sticking out in concentration as he ponders the puzzle.

“They showed me one of those not long after I came out of the ice,” Steve tells him. “I remember thinking you would have really liked it, if they’d had them when we were little. You always did have a head for puzzles.”

“Hydra had them,” Bucky says, weighing the cube in his palm. “It was a good way to keep me occupied if it took a long time to deploy me, or we had to wait.”

A cold shiver goes through Steve. He doesn’t realize he’s looked away until he feels Bucky’s fingers resting on top of his hand.

“Steve,” he says, “I’m fine with it. Just because something was an approved downtime activity on my missions doesn’t mean I’m going to avoid it for life.”

“Of course.” Steve takes his hand away and glances at his unfinished sketch. The pencil marks are broad and smudged, unrecognisable as any landscape or profile. He's too distracted for art, clearly.

Bucky twists the pieces of the cube a few more times, then holds it up to Steve, triumphant. Steve looks at the neat squares of colour: a perfect solution. He wishes he was as good at solving his own problems as Bucky seems to be.

“Let’s see what you got,” Bucky says, and passes the cube to Steve.

It only takes him about ten minutes to give up in frustration. But then, when they took that art class in 1941, Bucky’s drawings always looked like stick figures, so he considers it tit for tat.

* * *

“Tell me,” Bucky says, thoughtful, over drinks at a neighbourhood bar, “if I hadn’t sent the ticket, would you have tried to find me?”

Steve spears an olive with a cocktail stick, and answers as honestly as he knows: “Yes.” He pops it in his mouth; the briny taste is welcome, familiar. He’s reminded of sea air, of the salt of dried sweat he licked off Bucky’s collarbone the night before.

And it’s true. He would have tried, eventually, but he was afraid of making things worse. Of sending Bucky right back to square one.

Steve’s answer seems to satisfy Bucky; he drops his eyes back to his beer, and his shoulders relax.

* * *

“You never tell me what you like,” Bucky says as he presses into Steve, very slow. His palm is splayed out over the back of Steve’s thigh, kneading the skin there.

“I like this, Buck,” Steve breathes, shaking with need already. “You inside me.”

“I know,” Bucky says. He pushes Steve’s thigh flush to his body so he can get deeper, and Steve whines. “But what else?”

“I don’t mind,” Steve says without thinking. “We can do whatever you want.”

“Now that just ain’t right,” Bucky mutters, and he stops moving. “Come on, Steve. Ask for what you want.”

Steve takes a deep breath. “It’s a little much, like this,” he forces himself to admit, shifting under Bucky. “The angle. Too deep.” He makes an apologetic face.

“Okay.” Bucky’s smiling as he drops Steve’s leg and pulls out. “Show me.”

So Steve rolls onto his side, pulls Bucky close with a hand, bending one knee upwards. It’s more intimate like this: Bucky pressed against his back, his breath in Steve’s ear and the metal arm around him, warm from the room’s heat.

Bucky pushes back in with a shuddering groan. “Steve,” he says, so quiet and reverent it’s not far from a prayer. “You okay?”

“Yeah,” Steve answers, and it’s the truth. “I’d be better if you moved, though.”

“Now who’s getting demanding,” is Bucky’s amused reply, but he listens.

Much later: Bucky drags his fingers through the mess of come on Steve’s belly, rubbing it into his skin. Steve squirms away half-heartedly, but he gives up, lets Bucky make patterns on his abdomen to his heart’s content.

“See,” Bucky says. He looks thoroughly pleased with himself. “That wasn’t so bad, was it? Actually letting yourself enjoy something for a change.”

Steve throws a pillow at his head.

* * *

“It’s been a month,” Natasha says over the phone. “You’re not dead, are you?”

“Clearly, you’d be talking to me if I was,” Steve tells her.

“I was thinking.” There’s mischief in Natasha’s tone. “Maybe I should come down there, crash your party.”

 _“Tell me he’s at least getting some,”_ comes the faint rumble of Sam’s voice in the background.

“I heard that,” Steve says. He imagines Natasha looking over at Sam and nodding. Sometimes he kind of hates his friends. “And we’re fine here. I don't need you to parachute in and save me.”

“That’s good, Steve,” she says, and it’s genuine. “You sound happy.”

* * *

Steve considers Natasha’s words when he goes to bed that night. Bucky’s already sleeping soundly, metal arm carelessly thrown over the pillow, one leg on top of the sheet.

He watches Bucky and feels like he’s breaking inside.

He _is_ happy, he thinks. It’s just — he isn’t sure he deserves any of it.

* * *

It’s late morning, after a run when Bucky finally confronts Steve.

It isn’t like Steve hasn’t been expecting this: it’s been building for the whole time he’s been here, in between all the sex and the laughter and the loaded looks Bucky gives him every time Steve presses his lips together and bites back words he shouldn’t say.

He watches Bucky get the grapefruit juice out of the fridge and pour it into two glasses. Bucky's eyes are hard, the lines around his mouth tight. Steve’s about to say something, to try for damage control, when —

“So,” Bucky says, flat. “You gonna tell me why we spend the whole time talking around each other?”

Steve is a rabbit caught in the headlights, blinking. “I don’t —” 

“You do know,” Bucky cuts in. He's breathing hard through his nose. “I've got my own ideas, Steve. But I need to know what it is from your side.”

Steve has to bite back a laugh: Bucky’s expression is akin to someone who’s just been told they’re going to the dentist for root canal work. Everything in his tense body language suggests he’s about two seconds from bolting.

Maybe that’s what makes Steve finally speak up.

“It still hurts,” he admits in a hot rush, feeling the blush already spreading over his face. “You leaving. I know, I wasn’t great. I didn’t know how to help you. But I was trying. And you just — left, Buck. You left.”

Maybe if Steve were a better person, he wouldn’t be saying these things. But Bucky’s absence had worn on him for more than a year, and the bruise it left on his heart hasn’t healed yet. He has to be honest about that, if nothing else.

“I’m sorry. I thought it’d be better for you if I left.”  Bucky lets his breath out shakily. “I wasn’t good, Steve. Not then. You know I wasn’t. But I never blamed you for any of it. You have to know that.”

Steve’s eyes are suddenly wet. He steps closer to Bucky, unsteadily. “Please, just, can I —”

Then he’s kissing Bucky, and Bucky is frowning. He gently pushes Steve back, keeping him at arm’s length with the metal hand on his chest.

“I know what you’re doing, Rogers,” he says sternly. “We’re not done talking about this.” But even as he says it, he's pulling Steve back in with a fistful of his shirt.

“Fine,” Steve says against Bucky’s mouth. “Just not now. Please.”

It’s either kiss Bucky or cry all over him, and the first option seems infinitely preferable to the second.

* * *

Steve isn’t sure whether this counts as talking about it, but a few days later, when they're browsing for antiques:

“I think I’m happy,” he says, aware of how ridiculous he sounds. “I don’t think I wanted to believe it before.”

Bucky’s examining a tarnished silver coffee pot; he doesn’t look up right away. “I noticed,” he replies. Bucky's voice is even, but his smile is bright, and so fond that Steve nearly has to look away. “I _do_ still know you.”

“Why didn’t you say anything,” Steve says, and it comes out wounded.

“I guess I needed to know it wasn’t just the guilt.”

With that, Bucky turns away. He beckons the owner over and they have a conversation in rapid-fire Spanish over the price of the coffee pot that Steve mostly follows, in between the rapid beating of his own heart.

* * *

When they get home, Bucky presses Steve against the door and kisses him, frantic and desperate.

There’s still a tender spot inside Steve from their earlier conversation, but he can't think about that now. It seems to him like honesty goes a long way with Bucky.

(It always did, come to think of it.)

Steve arches into Bucky, feels him hardening against his thigh. He's desperate to touch, but Bucky shoves his hands away, and then he’s dropping to his knees.

Careful fingers pull down Steve's shorts, and just like that, Bucky’s mouth is on his cock, licking at the head.

A low noise makes its way out of Steve’s throat. “Bucky,” he says, ragged, as Bucky takes him deeper into his throat. He sucks at him slowly, until Steve’s panting, one hand pressed into Bucky’s hair to stay upright.

Bucky’s eyes are open, and full of so much adoration that it makes Steve tremble. He strokes at Steve's hipbone with his metal thumb, impossibly gentle, and keeps going.

Steve tries not to make a noise when he comes, but a quiet, broken _“oh”_ slips out anyway.

“God, Steve,” Bucky says, wiping his mouth on the back of his hand. The curtain of his hair brushes Steve’s inner thigh. “Look at you.”

Steve’s a sweating, shaky mess, but he manages to reach for Bucky’s chin and pull him up.

“I love you,” Steve says, one hand touching Bucky’s cheek. It comes out flatter than he means it to, but it’s still the truest thing he’s ever said in his life. For the first time, he can imagine a future where he doesn’t have to feel choked with guilt every time he looks at Bucky. A future where they could _be._

Bucky’s lips are red and shiny, his eyes wide. “I know,” he says, half-exasperated, half-fond. “Like I said, I know you. And you’re still a dumbass.”

* * *

“I probably can’t stay here much longer,” Steve ventures unhappily, while they’re walking along the beach. The sand is warm between his toes; they’ve left their shoes up on the walkway. “The world might actually need saving again one of these days.”

Bucky sighs; one of his hands curls into a fist at his side. “I know.” He turns his gaze to the sea, brightening a little. “Hey, do you want to paddle?”

Steve stares at him. “Not really.” He pauses. “I don’t really like going in the water, not since —”

“Oh,” Bucky says as he realizes. A shadow passes over his face, and next thing, his fingers are in Steve’s hair and he’s kissing him.

“Bucky,” Steve gets out, half-breathless already. “Don’t do that. It’s fine.”

Despite the heat of the day, Bucky's wearing a couple of layers. His forehead is warm where it rests on Steve’s. “Okay,” he concedes. “But I get to say the same thing to you next time you feel like going on one of your guilt trips.”

Steve nods and says, “That’s fair, I guess.”

Bucky's smiling like someone’s just struck him very hard on the head. “So you don’t like water and I hate the cold. We’re a real pair, aren't we,” he says, dissolving into wheezy laughter; he has to lean forward and rest his hands on his knees to steady himself.

Steve sits down heavily on the sand, and Bucky joins him once he’s managed to stop laughing. The sun’s gone in, the air starting to cool, but it’s restful here. Quiet in a way Steve isn’t sure he’s ever known.

“I don’t know how we’re gonna do this, Buck," he says, slowly. He's afraid of what the answer will be, but he's also acutely, painfully aware of how much he wants to be a part of Bucky's life again.

“I was thinking,” Bucky says, pushing his toes into the damp sand, “the place in the old town would make a great vacation spot. And I plan on having a _lot_ of vacation time. With you.”

Steve is grinning the world’s most foolish grin, and it’s okay, because Bucky is, too. “You mean, you’ll come back to New York?” he asks, hardly daring to hope.

“A guy can’t play hooky forever.” Bucky gets a hand on Steve’s shoulder, brings him closer. “I’m sure I can make myself useful. But I’m not joining these Avengers of yours.”

“Deal,” Steve says, his heart filling up with sea and sky and all the possibilities before them. He’s still smiling when Bucky kisses him.

**Author's Note:**

> Probably the last post-TWS recovery fic I'll manage to squeeze in before Civil War josses all our headcanons *covers ears in denial*.
> 
> Some pictures of the [Puenta de las Flores (flower bridge)](http://www.espanarusa.com/en/hedonist/ad/hedonist/categories/Soul/curiosities/498624/@Espana-Valencia-Valencia#prettyPhoto).
> 
> Come say hi on [tumblr](http://glitteratiglue.tumblr.com/) if you like to yell about these two idiots.


End file.
